During the past summer the Mark Keppel dance team went to Japan to represent team USA in a pilot program that allowed them to attend World Championships. It was a tradition up until 2003 when the United States withdrew, but now that Keppel’s dance team was selected at nationals to attend, they were able to represent team USA as a whole, not necessarily just Mark Keppel. 

The program the dance team was allowed to compete in is a brand new program that hasn’t been widely publicized on social media platforms.  “The first [Dance Team] World Championship was started in 1981 in Japan and then died off and now we’re restarting it,” Mr. Arroyo, head of the dance team, stated. They are helping the national organization, Miss Dance Drill Team USA in order to restart that opportunity for American teams to compete. They selected some of their team routines to compete, but there were also solo routines that were selected not only from Keppel, but also West Torrance High School, in order to compete in the solo categories.

They competed in these sections to help pilot the experience so that next year it could be open to all high schools in the United States to attend if they end up qualifying at nationals. Mr. Arroyo explained, “We were just selected just as an honoree to go and help restart the program.” 

Turning to Keppel’s results in the championship. Their team routines didn’t do as great as they normally have done, mostly because they lost a lot of graduating seniors. In addition, there were several students who weren’t able to or weren’t interested in coming on the trip. This led them to have to replace dancers during the summer. Without a lot of the seniors and the fact that the dance team doesn’t normally practice as much during the summer  as they do during the school year, so a national competition during the school year wouldn’t have been as tough as it was during summer break.

They may not have done so well, but Mr. Arroyo and the rest of the members that did go had a great time. According to Mr. Arroyo, “It was an exciting time, our kick routine, which was a world championship winning routine at nationals in March finished third.” It was a surprise to the team when they placed third and the male soloists did great, but unfortunately were unable to place. One of the dance team soloists, Athina Wu, was the recipient of the President’s Award which was given to her by the president of the World Championship Dance Competition because her solo was the highest scoring solo of the whole event. Moreover, two boys from West Torrance High School managed to finish first and second in the solo category as well.